In an era of unprecedented access to information, the institutions underpinning scientific inquiry face relentless challenges. Misinformation campaigns, politically motivated distortions, and the deliberate propagation of pseudoscience have fueled widespread…
At its core, science is a dynamic process of iterative inquiry, grounded in the recognition that human understanding is provisional and subject to revision. Unlike static belief systems, the scientific…
The system’s resilience is evident in its historical trajectory. The retraction of Andrew Wakefield’s fraudulent 1998 study linking vaccines to autism—a process spanning over a decade—demonstrates how peer critique, failed…
Peer review and repeatability form the twin pillars of scientific accountability. Together, they transform individual findings into collective knowledge, ensuring that science remains a collaborative correctional process rather than a…
Repeatability separates robust findings from statistical noise or fraud. When the Open Science Collaboration attempted to replicate 100 psychology studies in 2015, only 36% yielded consistent results—a crisis that spurred…
Critiques of science often stem from misapprehensions of its iterative nature. Clarifying these can rebuild public trust: “Science is always changing, so it cannot be trusted.” Rebuttal: Scientific knowledge is…
Scientific literacy—the ability to interrogate claims, weigh evidence, and grasp the provisional nature of scientific knowledge—is a bulwark against misinformation. Empowering the public to distinguish rigorous research from pseudoscience requires…
Trust in science hinges on its willingness to confront its flaws while upholding its core ethos: evidence over ideology, revision over dogma. Methodological Vigilance: Reforms like preregistration (detailing hypotheses/methods before…
Trust in institutions that curate knowledge—media, academia, journalism—has eroded not organically, but through deliberate campaigns that weaponize doubt. This “epistemic fragmentation” replaces shared empirical frameworks with atomized realities, where truth…
In a conversation the use of this particular attack was the impetus for me wanting to address not only 'publish or perish' but the larger efforts to attack science generally.…